Reset local administrator account password

Today I encountered a strange “issue”. Our service provider deployed us a virtual machine (windows server 2008) which i customized to serve as a template a couple of weeks ago. I syspreped it and copied the vhd away. Today i created a vm based on this vhd but after the boot the mini setup came up but i wasn’t asked to set the admin password. As i syspreped it i chose enter oobe and generalize. If someone knows why please drop me a note.

Why am I writing a post about that? Because I wanted to show you a cool tool if you ever forget a password of a local account (and for sure we wouldn’t use this tool for illegal purposes 😉 ). I think most of you already know this tool but maybe I can help someone with this post (and myself not forgetting about this tool ^^ ). The tool is called Offline NT Password Reset and Registry Editor. You can get it from here pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/. If you use the cd version it’s pretty straight forward just insert the cd and boot from it. Then follow the instructions on the screen. I don’t think I have to write more about it.